Botswana, officially the Republic of Botswana, is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. Botswana is topographically flat, with approximately 70 per cent of its territory being the Kalahari Desert. It is bordered by South Africa to the south and southeast, Namibia to the west and north, and Zimbabwe to the northeast. It is connected by the Kazungula Bridge to Zambia, across the world's shortest border between two countries.
Telecommunications in Botswana include newspapers, radio, television, fixed and mobile telephones, and the Internet.
Modern telecommunications in Thailand began in 1875 with the deployment of the first telegraph service. Historically, the development of telecommunication networks in Thailand were in the hands of the public sector. Government organisations were established to provide telegraph, telephone, radio, and television services, and other government agencies, especially the military, still control a large estate of radio and television spectra. Private telecommunication operators initially acquired concession agreements with state enterprises. For mobile phone services, all the concessions have been amended by successive government to last 25 years have gradually ended in 2015. For other services, the concession terms and conditions vary, ranging from one to fifteen years. Nearly all of the concessions are build-operate-transfer (BTO) contracts. The private investor has to build all the required facilities and transfer them to the state before they can operate or offer services to public.
The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) is an Australian government statutory authority within the Communications portfolio. ACMA was formed on 1 July 2005 with the merger of the Australian Broadcasting Authority and the Australian Communications Authority.
.bw is the Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for Botswana. It is officially administered by the Botswana Communication Regulatory Authority since 2013, previously being administered by the University of Botswana.
The Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA) is an independent regulatory body of the South African government, established in 2000 by the ICASA Act to regulate both the telecommunications and broadcasting sectors in the public interest.
The Internet in Botswana is used by about 28.4% of the population. This is slightly lower than the figure of 28.6% for Africa as a whole in 2015.
The Internet in Zimbabwe has seen rapid expansion in recent years. The Internet country code top-level domain is .zw. In 2009, the Mugabe-Tsvangirai Government of National Unity established a Ministry of Information and Communications Technology to focus on ICT growth and development.
In communication, media are the communication outlets or tools used to store and deliver content. The term generally refers to components of the mass media communications industry, such as print media, publishing, the news media, photography, cinema, broadcasting, digital media, and advertising.
Botswana Telecommunications Authority (BTA) is a dissolved independent commission that was responsible for regulating all matters related to telecommunications, postal services of Botswana and has been succeeded by Botswana Communications Regulatory Authority. The Minister appoints all five board members, who serve on a part-time basis. The BTA is mandated to promote the development and provision of efficient telecommunications and broadcasting services in Botswana, under the terms of the Telecommunications Act 15 of 1996. There have been legal disputes between the BTA and licensed operators, springing from issues related to interconnection and pricing.
The Botswana National Broadcasting Board (NBB) was set up by the Broadcasting Act, 1998. The Board consists of eleven members who were appointed in August 2000. Section 10 of the Act, includes Board functions such as the issuing of broadcasting licences and the control and supervision of broadcasting activities, including the relaying of radio and television programmes from places in and out of Botswana to places in and outside Botswana.
Statistics Botswana (StatsBots) is the National statistical bureau of Botswana. The organization was previously under the Ministry of Finance and development planning as a department and was called Central Statistics Office. The organisation was initially set up in 1967 through an Act of Parliament – the Statistics Act and thereafter transformed into a parastatal through the revised Statistics Act of 2009. This act gives the Statistics Botswana the mandate and authority to collect, process, compile, analyse, publish, disseminate and archive official national statistics. It is also responsible for "coordinating, monitoring and supervising the National Statistical System" in Botswana. The office has its main offices in Gaborone and three satellite offices in Maun, Francistown and Ghanzi. The different areas in statistics that should be collected are covered under this Act and are clearly specified. The other statistics that are not specified can be collected as long as they are required by the Government, stakeholders and the users.
Botswana Energy Regulatory Authority (BERA) is the energy regulator and a government parastatal of the Botswana government. The parastatal was founded after the Botswana Energy Regulatory Act was put in place in 2016 and started its operations on the 1st September, 2017.
The Pula Fund is the sovereign wealth fund of Botswana. As of October 2023, the fund has US$4.1 billion in assets under management.
